The World Bank is urging wealthy countries to set up a “vulnerability fund” to aid poor countries hit hard by the global financial crisis.

Ahead of the two day Group of Seven talks, the World bank President, Robert Zoellick said, “I propose that developed countries agree to devote 0.7 percent of their stimulus packages to a vulnerability fund to support the most needy…What began as a financial crisis has become an economic crisis, and is now becoming an employment crisis, and without countries’ action could become a human crisis on a global scale.”

He said the fund proposed by the World Bank was “doable, and would be a very positive outcome of the G20 meeting.”

“The World Bank estimates that from 2009 to 2015 between 200,000 and 400,000 more children will die of hunger each year, or between 1.4 million and 2.8 million. Some 46 million more people may fall into poverty if the global financial crisis persists… The crisis will also impede efforts to achieve Millennium Development Goals, which notably include that of slashing poverty in half by 2015,” Zoellick said.